#ILookLikeAnEngineer: Women fire back at negative response to tech ad

A woman's appearance on a tech poster received a flurry of comments that were widely deemed sexist, triggering a counter hashtag confronting stereotypes of women engineers. Platform engineer Isis Wenger started #ILookLikeAnEngineer as a response to the overwhelming attention she received after being featured in her company's ad recruitment campaign.

In a blog post, Wenger shared Facebook comments saying the ad was "appealing to dudes", referring to her "sexy smirk" and questioning if the poster was an honest representation of female engineers.

medium.com

Wenger struck back, discussing how reactions to the ad were symptoms of a larger problem of sexism in the tech industry.

Some people think I’m not making “the right face”. Others think that this is unbelievable as to what “female engineers look like”. News flash: this isn’t by any means an attempt to label “what female engineers look like.” This is literally just ME, an example of ONE engineer at OneLogin. The ad is supposed to be authentic. My words, my face, and as far as I am concerned it is.medium.com

Using #ILookLikeAnEngineer, Wenger began a campaign to "redefine 'what an engineer should look like'".